Literature / Peony in Love

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Peony has just turned sixteen and is ready to marry the husband she has been betrothed to by birth, even though she has never once met him. On the outside, she is an obedient daughter content with being locked in her house by her family for her entire life; on the inside, Peony secretly longs for passion, adventure, and an opportunity to see the outside world, much like the heroine of The Peony Pavilion, an opera which Peony is obsessed with, does.

Then, during a performance of The Peony Pavilion, Peony sees a handsome man, and Love at First Sight ensues.

Peony In Love by Lisa See is novel that not only explores the effect of qing and poetry in Chinese society during the reign of the Manchus, but also vividly depicts the realm of the Chinese underworld and ultimately, the many forms of love.

Daddy's Girl: Peony has a strong bond with her father and is hurt when she discovers that because she's a daughter, and not a son, she's not as valuable to him as she thought.

Death by Childbirth: Tan Ze. Because of this she's sent to the Blood-Gathering Lake in the afterlife, which is a special hell for women who fail at childbirth. Thankfully averted by Quin Yi, who nearly dies but survives, giving Wu Ren a long-awaited son.

Deliberate Values Dissonance: Lisa See's really shown her work. The grotesque manner of footbinding is touted throughout the book as something positive and helpful, as it allows women to make respectable marriages, and seen as a sign of defiance to the Manchus, while the talk of a woman's only duty is to bear sons and serve her husband's family very accurately replicates the attitude of most during China at the time.

Interestingly enough, this book also manages to convey feminist themes, with the abundance of poetry written by women and the extremely prevalent theme that all women want to be heard and have a voice.

Happily Married: Thanks to Peony, Wu Ren finds marital bliss with Quin Yi. His marriage to Tan Ze was only happy in his end, since Peony was forcing Tan Ze through most of her wifely duties (which he was unaware of).

Intelligence Equals Isolation: Peony is the most intellectually gifted and emotionally aware girl in her family's home, and she suffers hard for it.

Nice Guy: Wu Ren is amazingly nice. Quin Yi, his third wife (despite her early death Peony counts as his first, because in their culture a betrothal was essentially as valid as a wedding ceremony) is a Nice Girl.

Succession Crisis: The women in Peony's wealthy family (including the concubines) are unable to produce sons/heirs. However, there's a reason for it. Peony's dead grandmother cursed her son's family with barrenness as revenge, because he and her husband forced her to die in their place while the Manchu soldiers were hunting them down. She later lifts the curse at Peony's request.

The Lost Lenore: A zig-zagged example where the dead, beautiful woman is the main character. However, Peony is certainly this for Wu Ren, who continuously grieves for her after she dies.

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